The following is a quotation from the story listed below: "Right now some high schools and ABC News declare Wikipedia off limits. One cannot use it as a source." If I were a professor, it would not be allowed as a source in my courses, either.

My position is that one must already know a lot about a given subject for Wikipedia to be any good. So, what's the point? Most--if not all of us--use it only because it's fast.

http://abcnews.go.com/Nightline/story?id=2427262&page=2

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20060801/0128222.shtml

9/13/2006 4:57:35 AM

well duh.

it's a quick reference, not a legitimate source material.

9/13/2006 5:45:33 AM

I'd say ^ pretty much nailed it

You shouldn't use it for academic research anymore than you should use "Ned's Page on Necrophelia"

But you can check it out and see if it leads you to any legitimate sources. Hell, when I was in high school, the only legitimate sources were .edu or .org sites. You could get by with .com if it was a fact about the company that ran the site.

9/13/2006 6:59:29 AM

^^ Ditto.

9/13/2006 8:36:46 AM

I would say it's about equivalent to using an encyclopedia.

And I haven't used one of those in an academic paper since elementary school.

9/13/2006 9:00:25 AM

I used it for a paper in class last semester, but I already knew a lot about the subject and was just getting things like sales numbers from the article (which were cited).

[Edited on September 13, 2006 at 9:10 AM. Reason : makes those kinds of figures easier to find]

9/13/2006 9:10:31 AM

If it is an academic encyclopedia there is no problem in using it.

As for wiki, it's a great source to find source material.

9/13/2006 9:11:07 AM

Quote :

"I would say it's about equivalent to using an encyclopedia."

No, its the equivalent of using an encyclopedia that your neighbor wrote and another neighbor approved.

9/13/2006 9:56:43 AM

It just so happens that my neighbor helped write the Encyclopedia Britannica (kidding).

9/13/2006 10:00:20 AM

It does cite sources sometimes, which can then be looked up and referenced. So, it's not all bad, but it shouldn't be a sole source on a subject.

9/13/2006 10:34:51 AM

assume wiki is always wrong. use multiple sources.

9/13/2006 10:36:38 AM

assume Josh#### is always trolling

9/13/2006 10:51:13 AM

In my experience, it's rare for Wiki to be any more wrong than an encyclopedia would be.

9/13/2006 1:09:02 PM

I love Wikipedia. I find the articles to be current, informative, and written for a general audience. It's usually the first place I look for information on a subject. That said, it's credibility is obviously questionable and teachers have every right to ban it as a source of research.

9/13/2006 1:10:56 PM

Quote :

"Wikipedia, the encyclopedia that relies on volunteers to pen nearly 4 million articles, is about as accurate in covering scientific topics as Encyclopedia Britannica, the journal Nature wrote in an online article published Wednesday. The finding, based on a side-by-side comparison of articles covering a broad swath of the scientific spectrum, comes as Wikipedia faces criticism over the accuracy of some of its entries. "

http://www.wired.com/news/culture/0,69844-0.html

This thread has been done before and discussed to death. Basically, on subjects that aren't particularly volatile, it should be just as good as an encyclopedia.

9/13/2006 1:12:48 PM

I'm wary of people that phrase important questions to elicit simple "yes" or "no" answers. Sometimes I trust Wikipedia. Sometimes I don't. I looked up an article the other day and noticed at the top it had a information quality disclaimer on it. I thought that was nice. Unlike the news, press releases, or White House press secretary, at least Wikipedia will tell you when the information they're presenting has a big degree of bullshit in it.

9/13/2006 2:23:48 PM

.

[Edited on September 13, 2006 at 2:29 PM. Reason : .]

9/13/2006 2:29:00 PM

While doing research the other day for a group project we came across a paper published by the Harvard Medical School that cited Wikipedia as a source. We wondered what they were smoking.

9/13/2006 9:06:03 PM

I don't care that this "thread has been done before and discussed to death" or who is "wary of people that phrase important questions to elicit simple 'yes' or 'no' answers." I posted the Wikipedia thread because _Nightline_ did a story about it last night, which makes the story a current "In the News" topic for discussion. If it bores you or you're distrustful of the person posting, simply don't reply.

9/13/2006 11:46:49 PM

I trust wikipedia enough to use it in wolfweb debates. You can draw whatever conclusions you want to from that about my opinion of wolfweb debates.

9/14/2006 1:42:26 AM

Understood, GrumpyGOP.

9/14/2006 2:05:39 AM

"I am reminded of the professor who, in his declining hours, was asked by his devoted pupils for his final counsel. He replied, 'Verify your quotations'" (Winston Churchill).

9/14/2006 3:54:40 AM

it's great for getting a general overview on a lot of subjects, but i certainly wouldn't cite it on a research paper and if a professor allowed it to be used, i'd question where he got his degree

doesn't mean the facts are wrong (a lot of the entries are just common knowledge), it just doesn't hold a lot of clout in the world of academia

9/14/2006 5:27:38 PM

FYI by only saying that schools are declaring Wikipedia off-limits is misleading in terms of the article

[Edited on September 14, 2006 at 5:45 PM. Reason : ^]

9/14/2006 5:44:11 PM

I frankly think it's absurd. A student can be taught to use Wikipedia intelligently. And should be.

9/14/2006 6:45:18 PM

I use it as a quick reference to get a broad picture of something

I also use it for trivia on important figures for my lectures. Stuff to catch students' attention, but that's irrelevant to core knowledge. If 15% of it's false, then "eh"; If I've never read the trivia before in scholarly literature, I preface it with "some people claim..."

9/14/2006 9:11:22 PM

Quote :

"In a July 2006 episode of the satirical comedy The Colbert Report, Stephen Colbert announced the neologism "wikiality" (a portmanteau of the words "Wikipedia" and "reality") for his segment "The Wørd": You see, any user can change any entry, and if enough other users agree with them, it becomes true. ... If only the entire body of human knowledge worked this way. And it can, thanks to tonight's word: Wikiality. Now, folks, I'm no fan of reality, and I'm no fan of encyclopedias. I've said it before. Who is Britannica to tell me that George Washington had slaves? If I want to say he didn't, that's my right. And now, thanks to wikipedia, it's also a fact. We should apply these principles to all information. All we need to do is convince a majority of people that some factoid is true. ... What we're doing is bringing democracy to knowledge.[1] According to Colbert, together "we can all create a reality that we all can agree on; the reality that we just agreed on." During the segment, he joked "I love Wikipedia... any site that's got a longer entry on truthiness than on Lutherans has its priorities straight." Colbert also used the segment to satirize the more general issue of whether the repetition of statements in the media leads people to believe they are true. Colbert suggested that viewers change the elephant page to state that the number of African elephants has tripled in the last six months. The suggestion resulted in vandalism of Wikipedia articles related to elephants and Africa. Wikipedia administrators subsequently restricted edits to the pages by anonymous and newly created users and suspended Stephen Colbert's user account."

9/14/2006 11:14:07 PM

Goebbels, the master of Wikireality.

9/15/2006 2:10:20 AM

I find that Wiki's pretty good for dry (as in non-controversial) stuff. Math, formulae, stuff like that.

Then again, that's the kind of material which you generally don't have to cite anyway because it's general information and doesn't need attribution. *shrug*

9/15/2006 2:19:10 AM

aha

stephen colbert got suspended

9/15/2006 3:43:29 AM

^^i know some scientists and mathematicians who might take issue with you not citing their work.

9/15/2006 3:53:33 AM

Yeah every time I look up a differentiation formula I haven't used in four years and don't cite it, Sir Isaac Newton comes back to life and kills a puppy.

9/15/2006 8:15:53 AM

^^ well you wouldn't cite Euler's formula's or a specific Langrange transform.... I suppose if you were using formulas that came out of new research last year, then it'd be cool to cite it.

9/15/2006 9:14:55 AM

to end this argument, "Jabba the Hutt" is the featured article for today.

9/15/2006 9:46:07 AM

and i bet there is a bounty of info on jabba

9/15/2006 10:13:06 AM

It's about as well informed as the SoapBox is.

9/28/2006 4:10:03 PM

Wikipedia is pretty good - damn good for basic non-political issues.

Quote :

"My position is that one must already know a lot about a given subject for Wikipedia to be any good. "

I think this is exactly backwards. Wikipedia is good is you know nothing about a topic and want to get a quick overview.

One must also remember that experts are just people. They can easily be wrong. When World Book puts together their Encyclopedia they commission experts for the articles. Often, however, experts are wrong. Paticularly when it comes to general information.

Taking economics for example, there is lots of basic economics that even Nobel Prize winners can get wrong simply because it doesn't coincide with their research. There is a lot of stuff on taxes that Paul Krugman gets wrong despite the fact the he is all but certain to win a nobel prize.

9/28/2006 6:03:27 PM

A lie repeated often enough becomes the truth.

9/28/2006 9:09:38 PM

http://www.nature.com/news/2005/051212/full/438900a.html

I'm sure this has been read. It's not so much saying that wikipedia is accurate, as much as that it's not really that much worse than britannica.

But really, I don't think there's much that can be added to this thread that hasn't been said.

1) Good jumping off point for research.
2) Fairly reliable about science.
3) Citing any encyclopedia for a formal college paper should get you an F.

Think that's all been said right?

9/28/2006 9:24:46 PM

This is a dumb thread. Wikipedia is one of the best sites in the universe.

9/28/2006 9:37:49 PM

Quote :

"A lie repeated often enough becomes perceived as the truth."

[Edited on September 29, 2006 at 8:06 AM. Reason : /]

9/29/2006 8:05:59 AM

Consider it the "Stock Market of Truth". It's not expert opinion but it does aggregate opinion to a consensis. Sometimes one person doesn't know everything, but a lot of people know small snipets.

For example, the stock market approach has legitimate uses in business forecasting. They have found that it's more accurate to set up a forecast stockmarket than to let the marketing department do the forecast. Many people can have small amounts of information from diverse sources. A stock market approach aggregates that diverse opinion up to a single number.

That being said, "Trust, but verify".

[Edited on September 29, 2006 at 9:57 AM. Reason : *~<]Bo]

9/29/2006 9:56:34 AM

I dunno about science or anything, but Wikipedia tends to be pretty accurate when it comes to documenting internet phenomena

see

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ytmnd

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Something_Awful_Forums

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fark

9/29/2006 12:29:21 PM

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_wolf_web

9/29/2006 12:30:43 PM